Investigation underway into daughter's allegation Iowa man was prolific serial killer

Investigation underway into daughter's allegation Iowa man was prolific serial killer

Daughter says there were about 70 victims, sheriff says
The woman, identified at her request in a Newsweek article Monday by her maiden name, Lucy Studey, said her father killed roughly 70 women, mostly prostitutes and runaways, and buried them on the family's rural 5 acres, Aistrope said. The tract is about 40 miles from Omaha, Nebraska.

Aistrope said he and his deputies began looking into her claims in 2021 when she contacted the sheriff's office for at least the second time to report that there were "five or six" dead women buried on the land her father lived on until his death in 2013.

She told them the bodies had been buried in and around the old well in a wooded area that was later logged. Sheriff's investigators spent much of the last year attempting to find the well and get permission from the current owners of the property and neighboring properties to conduct searches, Aistrope said.

The well, since filled in, was 90 feet deep and excavating it would be a major undertaking, Aistrope said.

He said it's hard to believe that many women could have disappeared from the Omaha area — where Studey's daughter told Newsweek her father hunted for victims — without drawing attention. But if some of the women were from other cities, Aistrope said, he can imagine it was possible.